Gien - St Satur

I woke up early this morning to try and get a good start to the day, but it was raining so instead I stayed in bed until 8. The rain stopped though so I packed up my wet tent and left.

I went about 10-15km down the road to Briare. There is a canal bridge there which was cool to see. Not a bridge over a canal, but a bridge that is a canal. It goes over the Loire so the canal boats don't have to deal with the current in the river.

On the other side I stopped to figure out where to go and a bloke wheeled his bike up to me. He was English, heading the opposite way starting at Basel. He told me the ride is really good to Basel and he's been camping up next to the canal each night. He'd actually camped on this patch of grass next to a shop where I was stopped. I talked to him for ages and he ended up giving me these excellent maps that he'd been using but didn't need anymore. He said he'd cycled from Beijing to Shanghai before and it was really good and recommended cycling through China.

After I said farewell and set off again the wind picked up. And up. And up. It is brutal today. I'm at the bottom of the hill that Sancerre sits on, which is 50km from where I met Geoff, and it was a gale force headwind the entire way. I'm amazed I managed to churn through the kms as quickly as I did. At some parts I was in the lowest gear, 1,1, on a flat paved surface. At other times when the wind was coming from an angle I was leaned over so far that the peddles were almost touching the ground. I needed my helmet for all the branches falling on me. Some powerlines came off the pole so they were swaying at about head height next to the path. I was worried they'd tear away from the remaining poles and take my head off.

At one point when I'd been blown to a standstill I saw a bike race go past. I'm not sure what it was, but there were loads of cyclists and loads of support vehicles. The coolest thing is the noise they make. There are whistles and sirens and bells, then the sound of the bikes whizzing along. It's like a high speed, high pitch parade.

So I made it to St Satur. Like I said, Sancerre is up a steep hill. It's a very famous wine town. The best sauvignon blanc comes from there. It's one of the must see places, but I'm pretty sure that's only if you're a wine snob. Which I'm not. So I'm not bothering with the hill. If I meet some wine snobs I'll just say I went and that they "really must try to make the effort".

I'm camped amongst some trees, one of which has fallen over. I found a spot with only little trees, but they have fruit so every few minutes these green things fall on the tent. I have a feeling it will be windy tomorrow too, but if it isn't I will probably get past Nevers and off the Loire route. From there it is east to Basel.

Finally, congratulations to Matt and Aga. Great news to hear after a shit day. I'm pretty sure Matt and Mum are the only people that read this blog, so now Matt has his hands full I may as well just address it to Mum.

So mum, can I borrow some money?